


don't stop trying to find me here amidst the chaos.

by neosanctuaire



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Angst, Canon Dialogue, M/M, MAG 159 spoilers, The Lonely - Freeform, but what if mag 159 was like REALLY really orpheus and eurydice??, i love jm too much unfortunately, it could have been very sad but it was not, jon: rip to orpheus but i'm different. i would simply not turn around, not beta'd but at this point i don't even need to tell yall that, resolved angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-28
Updated: 2019-10-28
Packaged: 2021-01-13 17:09:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,685
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21183701
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/neosanctuaire/pseuds/neosanctuaire
Summary: Love. What a terrifying word.





	don't stop trying to find me here amidst the chaos.

**Author's Note:**

> _"Don't stop trying to find me here amidst the chaos_  
Though I know it's blinding there's a way out  
Say out loud, we will not give up on love now."  
(orpheus - sara bareilles)

“To go into the Lonely willingly is as good as death.”

Elias’ words hold no real threat in their cadence; they drip with a wet, sticky saccharine timbre that makes Jon feel distinctly unwell. To look at him stirs no feeling in Jon— Elias looks much the same as he always has, and has it always has his smile is not a terrible thing, but something soft at the edges and all to easy to look at. It is his  _ voice. _

The Lonely terrifies Jon in a way he has had trouble admitting, but as he can feel the memory of Martin’s bright eyes already slipping through his fingers the decision is already made for him. If Jon would give several ounces of bone to go wander Daisy’s footsteps, staking however many kilos of flesh and fat left on himself seems like a natural progression. 

As such, in Jon’s voice there is no hesitation as he spits at Elias; “How do I do it?” And Elias smiles— he smiles so wide that Jon thinks for a moment those neat lines of white teeth with eclipse his face entirely and devour Elias entirely. It is a delusion, of course. No matter what he is, Elias is still shaped like a man. 

Jon hopes he still is, as well.

“Just open your mind, drink it all in,  _ know _ their route.” Elias’ gaze is heavy on Jon’s skin and he has no idea how much of him he sees, likely far more than Jon knows is there. After all, isn’t it Elias who chose Jon for this? “Simply… follow it, Jon. Take my blessing with you as you go.” 

It’s enough to make Jon’s blood boil; even at a time like this Elias cannot resist taking a low jab, digging in between Jon’s ribs. Even if the idea of Elias’  _ blessing _ wasn’t a farce in and of itself, Jon knows it holds no weight in the realm of the Lonely. Not even Elias can reach inside to carefully rearrange its parts to his liking; it flows as a free fluid from Peter’s palms and takes whatever shape its prey desires of it. 

If Jon squints, he can say that Elias has created the him that he’s become— and to know that not even someone in that position can guide his hand in a place like that is a very lonely thing indeed. 

“Are you scared, Jon?” 

There’s no point in lying when Elias can see through him like glass. “Yes,” Jon answers as little more than a whisper and Elias smiles very wide and so terribly fondly, with a reverence so vast and empty that it makes Jon dizzy. 

“Perfect.” 

Even as Jon turns his back on Elias he can feel eyes burning holes in his back, slowly succumbing to the sinking feeling that if he lifts his eyes from the ground the head of the Archives will be standing directly in front of him with those wide slate eyes, full of their monstrous curiosity. Jon resigns himself not to look up again. 

Not until the weight of Elias’ gaze cannot reach him and the sound of his footsteps echo far too loud, and the low rolling rumble of the sea is almost deafening in his ears despite not being visible. But he can smell the surf and feel the chill of saltwater spray, and he follows the sound of the water as deep as it will take him. 

Each street he finds himself on is devoid of any sign that human life has ever walked its path, sterile and yet somehow aching with disuse— atrophying. Jon feels slightly to the left of everything he sees, and if he looks away too long all of the buildings are just a bit farther away when he looks back at them. 

And the most terrifying part is that during that long walk, as his footfalls echo in his ears, Jon momentarily forgets why he’s here. But it’s those eyes, he reminds himself through a dull, dense fog— it’s Martin’s eyes and the smile that he hasn’t seen in so long. He’ll see it again before he dies, it’s a promise Jon makes to himself in that moment; he carves it so deeply into that space behind his eyes that it will likely be the very last thought he is capable of when his time comes. 

Martin’s smile, soft and full of life. It’s so, so beautiful. 

“He doesn’t want to see you.” Peter’s voice is easy to recognize, and Jon thinks he might have realized he was there several unsteady heartbeats before he spoke. He just as easily might not have— the movement of time loses Jon somewhat as it snakes around with no destination. 

When Jon turns Peter is not there, and such a thing really should not surprise him considering where he is. That doesn’t stop it from being frustrating, maybe even encroaching on infuriating. He only has so much time to find Martin, and he knows Peter knows that as well. 

“Where are you?” Jon hisses, feeling the subtle electricity of compulsion set the hairs on his arm upright. 

“I’m not here, Archivist. No one is,” Peter’s voice echoes from arbitrary points around him, off in the distance and right at the shell of Jon’s ear. “It’s only you.” 

With Peter as his only company, Jon honestly wishes that were true. “ _ Fine _ ,” he spits. “Then maybe  _ no one _ can answer some questions.” It’s a threat, and he knows it is not lost on Peter. There’s a reason Peter has kept him at such a cold distance from all of his plans— the danger Jon presents. It gives him a rush. 

“You’ve still got time, Archivist.” Peter’s voice is a cacophony, the way it echoes makes the words overlap and twist in Jon’s skull like a knife. He wishes he could get an eye on Peter even if only for a second, just long enough to make him choke on his tongue. “Turn around and go. Leave Martin to his loneliness, and mourn his loss in the waking world.”

“You already know I’m not going to do that.” Peter offers even more redundant propositions than Elias does; meaningless strings of words that he knows will go nowhere, only offered to play a part. Jon is tired of the stage, tired of the way he is expected to strut and fret as Elias’ poor player. If Peter is dissatisfied, he doesn’t bother to show it.

“That’s not wise, Archivist.” Peter hums in a way that is supposed to sound thoughtful, but comes of to Jon as nothing short of patronizing. “It’s odd, really. You each think you’re so focused on the other, but how much do you really know each other?” 

Peter leers at him from somewhere unseen, an attempt at cruelty that rolls its ankle over one small fact: Jon knows this already. “What are you seeking? The image you’ve each created of the other? The people you think you love don’t exist, Archivist— not  _ really _ .” Jon can  _ feel _ Peter’s smile, a lurid image in the stark greys and whites of the scene around him. “I think that’s a very lonely place to be.”

It is.

There is distance between Martin and himself that Jon hasn’t thought to cross before now, he always thought he’d have more time. How could he ever have known he’d never be afforded another opportunity to ask him how he takes his tea, or to ask him if he can read one of those poems Martin writes and pretends he doesn’t want people to read? 

There’s always supposed to be more time— it wasn’t supposed to run out so quickly. 

And it hasn’t, as long as Jon is still breathing. 

“Enough, Peter.” Jon’s voice is firm and echoes like a thunder crack, and somewhere behind him Peter flinches and Jon _ feels _ it. “I’ll ask you again,  _ where is Martin _ ?”

“I already told you—” there’s something strained in Peter’s voice, and Jon takes a very mundane delight in the sound. They’re so very close and getting closer at uncomfortable speeds. The only question that remains is to who is the iceberg. “He doesn’t… want to see you.” 

“Then let me hear that from him,” and it is a command, this time. Jon’s voice booms and static crackles deafeningly in his ears, but Peter’s gasp is louder still. 

He turns at last and comes face to face with a stricken Peter. This hand is to his forehead as if to ease a migraine that won’t pass, but through the cracks in his fingers he can see a pair of furious blue eyes. Unfortunately, looks that can kill is not something the Lonely is known for. 

“If you want to see him so bad, I won’t stop you,” Peter seethes, voice dripping out from a clenched jaw. “But I promise you, Archivist;  _ you’ll _ never get him out of here.” 

“Excuse me?”

“It’s a matter of  _ faith _ , Archivist, something of which you are in notoriously short supply.” Peter looks terribly proud at the fact that Jon visibly does not follow, brows drawing together into a pair of harsh lines. “If you have faith in yourself— if you have faith in  _ Martin _ simply close your eyes and go to him, and  _ do not _ open them if you’d like to see him ever again. After all, isn’t it true that we see best with our eyes closed?”

“You don’t make a convincing argument,” Jon grumbles.

“Does it matter if it’s convincing? I’m telling you how to retrieve your  _ beloved _ , you should thank me.” Peter smiles at him and Jon is forced to fight back the desire to carefully remove the smile from his face. “Once you’ve found him, all you have to do is leave. It’s very simple.”

“Too simple,” Jon echoes.

“Just simple enough for you to ruin on your own,” Peter hums. “And that, Archivist, will make all of this worthwhile.” 

And for all that he hates him and his terribly smug tone Jon knows that Peter is, at the bare minimum, not lying about his belief in Jon to ruin everything with his own hands. Is that the same belief Elias had that lead him to shephard Jon into the Lonely? Still—

“This sounds terribly obtuse."

“Sure,” Peter answers, tone once again light as though they were discussing work over coffee. “But unfortunately for you, I’m right at home here. This is going to be as obtuse as I want it to be.”

“Unless I make you reconsider,” and Jon is already reaching out for Peter only to find his hand swipe clean through air as Peter is gone. Grasping violently at the space where Peter had just been, Jon feels whatever it is that is known as the Archivist light every inch of his skin ablaze. “ _ Peter. _ ”

“Sorry, you took a bit too long,” Peter laughs directly into both of Jon’s ears and the sound makes him wish he was deaf. “Best of luck, Archivist. I do look forward to seeing how you mess this up.” 

And all at once it is silent. 

Jon is again by himself in the Lonely, thoughts deafened by the distant sound of water. He sees no merit in trusting Peter, and by extension playing directly into Elias’ hand yet again— though at this point he’s not sure what else he  _ can _ do. Perhaps it’s about time he accept that this mockery of a life he continues to live has finally spiralled fully out of his control. 

Martin is in the Lonely because that’s what Elias wanted, and Jon followed him which is also what Elias’ wanted. He feels like a dog on a leash, being lead around without a great deal of agency outside of whether or not to keep breathing; he isn’t even sure he has control over that, anymore. He’ll kill Elias, one day, and it will feel very good. 

But long before that there is Martin, just as there will be Martin long after. Jon’s perfect circle, a ring of gold— with Martin everything begins and ends. Like an aneurysm, it dawns on Jon with a sharp pain in his stomach that Martin may actually be someone he could love. 

Love. What a terrifying word. 

With nothing else to believe in, Jon closes his eyes and waits. He doesn’t know what he’s waiting for, and as he counts seconds that probably turn into minutes at some point, Jon realizes he’s waiting for nothing. There’s no  _ sign, _ all Peter had told him was to walk. 

So he walks. Jon puts one foot in front of another; at first each movement is tentative, but as he feels his surroundings shift around him and pull out of his way, he takes his steps with less caution. If this is the game Peter has deigned him play, he’ll play it. He’s the Archivist, it’s not as though he doesn’t know the way. 

Even with that, he almost trips when the cement sidewalk below him abruptly ends and he steps into pliant sand instead. The water is very loud here, crashing around on all sides of Jon; yet in a way that seems so much more organic than how he heard it before. His mind’s eye conjures the dismal image of a beach, stretching on endlessly and made of pale yellows and greys and blues— there is no path from which he came, and there is nothing sitting on the horizon. It is just a beach, forever. 

And as that clawing feeling of loneliness begins to dig in, Jon resolves himself that this must be it. 

“Martin?” He calls, voice breaking the silence in a way that seems blasphemous. When the ground doesn’t open up to swallow him alive for his transgression, however, he shouts again; “ _ Martin? _ ”

“... Hello, Jon,” Martin’s voice answers from either side of Jon, an empty echo in his ears. His voice is hollow, barely a shade of it’s usual bright tone, filled with life. Jon supposes that’s insincere— Martin hasn’t sounded like that in a long time. “... You came.” 

“Of course I came,” Jon says with such incredulity that it surprises himself, but it’s true— what else would he have done in this situation when he hadn’t even  _ considered _ an alternative to saving Martin. There is a whole world outside the walls of the Archives, and yet the thought of it missing a certain smile leaves it barren and lifeless. “N-Now come on, we’re getting out of here.”

“No,” Martin says softly. Jon forces his eyes closed harder to overcome the instinct to open them, to  _ see _ . “No… I don’t think so.” 

“ _ Why? _ ” Jon asks, aghast, heart thudding dumbly in his chest. 

“This is where I should be, it feels right.” And from his tone, he believes it— and that alone is enough to drive stake through Jon’s chest.

“Martin, don’t say that.”  _ Please, Martin _ .

“Nothing hurts here,” Martin muses with a gentle, vacant admiration. “It’s just quiet. Even the fear is gone, now.” 

“This isn’t right. This isn’t  _ you _ .” Jon reaches out blind, trying to grab for Martin and coming up empty handed. It’s distance, that’s all it is— and there is no distance Jon is unwilling to travel to reach Martin again. He has not come so far only to lose Martin again.

“It is, though.” Martin laughs bitterly, and the sound bites hard into the shell of Jon’s ear. “I really loved you, you know?”

It’s said with such a resigned melancholy that Jon is left breathless, motionless like a statue with his hand outstretched. He’s terribly dense, everyone knows that, but the words do not come as a surprise. But the way Martin  _ says _ them, like they are a burden to him, nearly kills Jon where he stands— this is a burden that Jon has laid on his back and wordlessly asked him to carry as Jon waited for tomorrow, and then tomorrow, and then tomorrow.

There is only so much time, he knows that now. 

“Martin… I’m sorry,” Jon chokes. 

“It’s fine, Jon,” Martin answers mechanically, a flat line on a heart monitor. “You should just go.” 

“I-I, I don’t  _ want _ to!” Jon’s voice falters finally, a desperate edge bleeding into his words. “I don’t want— I  _ can’t _ leave without you, Martin. We— I… I  _ need _ you.” Jon reaches out again, finally finding purchase in a pair of sleeves, clamoring to hold on to more and more of Martin until his shaking hands are gripping tight to his forearms. 

“No, you don’t. Not really,” Martin sighs, making no attempt to pull his limp arms away from Jon. “Everyone’s alone, but we all survive.” 

“I don’t just want to  _ survive _ !” Jon’s voice breaks on the upper note, cracking like a brittle pane of glass. “I want… a reason to keep going, Martin.” Martin is silent, but Jon can hear an uptake in his breath. “It could never be anyone but you.” 

“I…” 

“I came all this way to get you, Martin,” Jon says, voice unsteady but backed by an almost desperate confidence— a last ditch effort, a cornered animal. “I won’t leave without you.” 

There is a long moment where nothing moves except for Jon’s shaking hands, until he realizes it’s not just his hands that are shaking. In his grip, Martin is trembling. “J-Jon…?”

“Martin?” At the sound of his name, he can hear Martin take in a sharp breath. “Martin! Martin, I’m here. I-I’m right here!” Jon moves his grips to Martin’s hands and carefully brings them up to his face, pressing the uncharacteristically cool skin to his cheeks. 

Martin stays very still for a moment, barely breathing, before slowly tracing his thumbs over the rough lines of Jon’s cheeks. Jon waits as he feels out each wrinkle and scar and bump, mapping them all out with such an earnest tenderness that Jon is worried he might start to cry. 

Martin has no business touching a creature like him so softly— not when he’s put him through so much. 

“It’s really you,” Martin whispers, voice trembling as he struggles to get words out, fingers still restless over the planes of Jon’s face. Martin sniffles, and Jon reaches up blindly to clumsily wipe a tear from his face. As Martin leans his cheek into the touch, Jon leaves his hand there. “I… I was on my own. I was never going to see you again.” 

“You’re not alone anymore, Martin,” Jon says softly. He will be damned if he’s ever away from Martin’s side again. “I’m here, now. Come on… let’s go home.” 

“... How?” Martin asks. 

“Have a little faith, Martin,” Jon laughs weakly, tired. 

“Faith?” Martin repeats softly, chewing the word over to see how it tastes. “... Right. Sure, Jon.” 

Jon reaches up to take one of Martin’s hands from his cheek, lacing their fingers together carefully as thought if he squeezes too hard Martin will disappear on the wind. It’s Martin who squeezes, an attempt to be reassuring with a shaking hand. Jon wishes he could see him, run a hand through his hair and finally find out if it’s as soft as he thinks it is and be reassured by Martin’s smile that everything will be okay. 

He’ll have time for that later, though— he almost believes that now. Hope is a truly dreadful thing, but Jon is steadily running out of options. 

Martin’s hand firmly clutched in his own, Jon turns around and sets off in what is presumably the direction he came— it is behind him so logic would dictate that it is the same way he’d come, though it would be utterly remiss of him to assume a place like this to be dictated by something as banal as logic. 

Still, it comes as relief when his shoes eventually land on hard concrete of what he assumes is the sidewalk he’d previously walked to get to Martin. Jon can feel the scenary twisting and contorting to make room for him, and he wonders if Martin sees it too. If he does he doesn’t say anything, as all Jon can hear from Martin is the sound of his quick breaths and the thud of his shoes against the ground. 

It’s the first thing Jon thinks is strange, but certainly not the last. 

They start to pile up: the way Martin’s breath seems to be right at Jon’s neck while his footsteps echo what feel like feet behind him, and how his hands are so, so cold. Martin’s silence too, and the way the long walk home is  _ very _ long. 

The thing that worries Jon the most is Peter, or the seeming lack of him. Surely, despite what he said, Peter isn’t planning on letting Jon  _ actually _ walk straight out of the Lonely with Martin in hand. He had said he was counting on Jon to ruin it himself, but Jon clearly isn’t ruining anything— and Peter seems far too vain to let all of this go to waste on a lost bet. 

What starts as an errant thought grows more consistent with each step further he takes until it is angrily clawing at the backsides of his eyes; there’s no way for Jon to know it’s Martin that he’s leading out of the Lonely. It could be someone else entirely, some _ thing _ else— or it could be nobody. 

It’s a terribly foolish thing to put such stock in words from a Lukas, a friend of Elias’. Peter has absolutely nothing to gain from telling Jon the truth of how to rescue Martin from the calm depths of the Lonely’s grasp, and surely has something to gain from Jon leaving empty handed— or, perhaps not leaving at all. 

Was that Peter’s plan then, to lure Jon deeper and deeper into the Lonely with the promise of Martin, the true Martin, waiting somewhere at its deepest point? How far has Jon willingly let himself slip then, holding the hand of some shade? Too far, surely. 

Jon stops abruptly, and feels something in the vague shape of Martin bump into his back and make a surprised noise. Now convinced that he has fallen for a trick of Peter’s, Jon turns on a heel to blindly face was he has come to terms with as not Martin. He has had more than enough of things that wear the skins of people he cares about as a cheap threat. 

Even with all his convictions, Martin’s voice catches him off guard. “... Jon?” he asks softly. “Is everything alright?” And Jon wants to inform him that, no, everything is not alright and that this fake Martin should know that. But it sounds so much like Martin that Jon’s stomach flips uneasily at the thought of opening his eyes. 

There are two options for Jon to weigh: try to guide what could very well not be Martin out of the Lonely, or open his eyes and confirm the suspicions he has as either true or false. It seems like a simple choice when leaving out the fact that one of those options could very well involve Martin disappearing for good— the choice is a lot more muddled when there’s something like that to consider. 

All roads Jon travels truly do lead back to Martin, no matter how long. Jon is horrified by the fact that the idea of living the rest of his likely miserable life without Martin around is utterly unbearable. Something in his chest constricts uncomfortably at the mere thought, like he’s shrinking in on himself— like he’s disappearing as well. It’s all very irrational, and he hates himself for it. He used to be a terribly reasonable man.

What a dreadful thing is love, to make such a mess of a man like Jon. 

“Jon?” Martin asks again, voice curling in on itself in worry. He should never have to sound like that, Jon decides, though even before all this Martin was something of a worrywart. It’s not something he can change— he’d never want to— but if it’s in his power to ease Martin’s troubles at all, he must. 

“Sorry, Martin.” Jon tugs his lips into his best smile, one he is unfortunately very much out of practice with, in hopes of reassuring him. “Just getting my bearings.” 

It’s not exactly a lie, either— with the remaining doubts either cleared up or very stubbornly ignored, Jon  _ does _ have a better sense of his surroundings and the way they shift and churn in the brisk wind. When he starts walking again the ground under his feet somehow feels more solid, and Martin’s footfalls closer behind as though the world around him is slowly clicking back into place piece by piece. 

He pulls Martin along with an unwavering grip on his hand as the vastness of the space around them slowly shrinks, closing in and becoming less malleable. There’s less of a chill on the wind, and the sound of the ocean that had previously deafened Jon is now quiet as it fades away into the background. 

It’s one drop of rain that hits Jon square on the top of his head first, and then it’s ten more, and then it’s pouring. Jon’s first instinct is to open his eyes in shock, but he forces them to stay shut so as to not break whatever arbitrary rules have been set for him. 

“Pity,” he hears very faintly. It’s Peter’s voice so far from him he can barely hear it, and his blood runs cold. 

And then he barrels into something rigid yet ever so slightly pliant— somebody’s back, Jon realizes with a start. “The fuck?” He hears a gruff voice curse. “Watch were you’re going.” Whoever he’s just walked into checks him with their shoulder hard as they walk away, and it’s then that Jon notices all the  _ noise. _

The aggressive sound of car horns in midday traffic, the idle chatter of a busy London street, the torrential downpour of spring rain— Martin lets out a gasp behind him. 

“Jon, y-you— you really—” 

Jon is already in motion as he finally opens his eyes, turning sharply to face Martin— and God he is a beautiful sight with his red rimmed eyes and his curly hair pressed against his face from all the rain. His eyes are wide and bright, and if Jon were to drown in them he feels it might be a decent way to go out. He’s not going anywhere, however, not with Martin smiling at him like that. 

His arms are around Martin before he realizes he’s done it, and as he digs his fingers into the wet fabric of Martin’s jumper Jon realizes it’s far too late to back out of this. Martin’s response is a small, surprised squeak before he tentatively brings his arms up to wrap around Jon. 

They’ve hugged once, in similar circumstances, and their hands have brushed innumerable times during their exchanges of tea but it has been so  _ long _ and Martin is so warm and so _ real _ . It’s slightly mortifying to be doing this in the middle of a crowded street, more so when Jon feels tears prick at the corners of his eyes. He could run and hide, but he opts instead to bury his face in Martin’s shoulder. 

“J-Jon, are you…?” Jon can hear Martin’s voice from where it starts in his chest all the way to where it hits Jon’s ears, and it strikes him like a bolt that they are both very  _ alive _ and his breath catches in his throat. “Are you… crying?” 

“No,” Jon sniffles, the answer muffled by Martin’s shoulder. 

“Right,” Martin says softly, bringing a hand up to gently pet Jon’s hair. “Come on, Jon, let’s get out of the rain.” 

“Of course.” Jon pulls away and quickly wipes his eyes with the sleeve of his shirt. Everything comes back around to Martin in the end, and there is nowhere Jon would not follow him— it’s no harm done to him to duck into a cafe to get out of the rain, God knows they’ve both been in worse places. 

Ideally, they’ll find somewhere nice this time. 

**Author's Note:**

> thank you thank you thank you  
we all owe kay and oli our lives for this not having an extremely upsetting ending  
find me on twt @neosanctuaire and yell at me about mag 160


End file.
